


The Cat, The Prince, and The Doorway to Imagination

by Karalora



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: (but they're still themselves), (but you won't hate him for it), Action/Adventure, Fantasy, Gen, Mild Sexual Innuendo (because Remus), Narnia Setting, Nightmares, Roman is one Dramatic Boi, Sympathetic Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders, Sympathetic Deceit | Janus Sanders, The Imagination Room (Sanders Sides), Vague Symbolism, Villain!Roman - Freeform, Violence and Threats of Violence, petrification
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-23
Updated: 2021-02-15
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:53:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 16,674
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27679024
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Karalora/pseuds/Karalora
Summary: In the wake of the events of Putting Others First, Roman is desperate to feel like the hero, even if for just an afternoon. He invites the core Sides on an adventure in the Imagination, patterned after one of the great works of children's literature that features heroes and villains. But stories in the Imagination can take on a life of their own, and this one seems bent on pushing Roman to be the villain...
Relationships: DLAMPR (platonic), LAMP/CALM (platonic)
Comments: 26
Kudos: 48





	1. Through the Door

“ _I thought I was your hero.”_

Roman’s own words echoed hollowly in his memory. The fact was that the…the _occurrence_ with Deceit—Janus—had just been the culmination of a long, slow crisis of purpose for the prince. It wasn’t just the wedding vs. callback dilemma; it had been going on for months. Thomas’s cringing recollection of past phases he had gone through had gotten him wondering whether his current life path would eventually be added to that pile. There had been the encounter with the old friend who didn’t seem to think YouTube was a proper career. Before that had been the dispute with Logan over whether developing his artistic career was even valuable for its own sake, or just a way to keep the lights on and the fridge stocked. In fact…

It seemed to Roman that the period of misgivings had _actually_ begun when Deceit was introduced to Thomas in the first place. Roman himself had inadvertently drawn the connection between acting and deception, and for all Logan’s reassurances to the contrary, a seed of doubt remained.

If lying was wrong, and acting was a form of lying, and Roman was the linchpin of Thomas’s acting abilities…did that make Roman the bad guy all along?

“ _I thought I was your hero.”_

Was that why Thomas seemed to be hitting so many blocks when it came to his passions? Had Roman _tainted_ his own function?

What did it even mean to be a hero?

It had been so simple when they were young. A hero was someone who helped others, preferably by doing flashy, impressive things. Little Thomas had loved the idea of being a hero, and Roman—just Creativity, back then—had dutifully provided him with a portfolio of daydreams. In the fantasies Roman constructed, Thomas could be a firefighter, charging into a burning building in order to rescue a puppy. Or he could be a sheriff in the Old West, rounding up bandits and cattle rustlers. Or he could be a superhero, foiling bank robberies and catching crashing airplanes. But his favorite kind of hero to be was the fairytale prince with a magic sword, defeating wicked witches and saving fair maidens from dragons. He had sent his Creativity to tap that well so many times that the Side himself took on the form of the prince.

As Thomas grew, his ideas about heroism became more complicated, the focus of his imagination shifted, and Roman’s job changed drastically, to cover his Center’s artistic ambitions (and in time, his romantic ones). He hadn’t minded for the longest time, because Patton had been there to handle the new complexities. If Roman’s understanding of right and wrong was a floodlight sweeping across an open field, then Patton’s was a fog lamp, cutting through the gray haze of moral ambiguity. Roman had always been perfectly content to follow Patton’s lead, knowing that the father figure would never steer them wrong.

But now…Patton was sharing control of the fog lamp with _Janus_ , whom Roman had always understood to be one of the greatest villains of Thomas’s mind. Janus embodied dishonesty, selfishness, temptation to evil—exactly the traits a true hero should reject. The gray haze was where he thrived the most; how could they _possibly_ trust him to help guide Thomas through it?

Roman just wanted to understand.

“ _I thought I was your hero.”_

And until he could understand, he just wanted a _break_ from it all. A day where he could just follow his bliss without worrying that he was either playing into evil’s hands, or pushing Thomas to the breaking point. A day where he could just _be_ the hero, and know that he was the hero, and that he wasn’t about to be sucker-punched by all these _nuances_.

A day like the old days.

He wanted—he _needed_ —a simple adventure, one where good and evil were obvious, and he was the leader of the good guys, and they were able to beat the bad guys with a certain amount of peril and excitement but no actual doubt that they could do it and that it was the right thing to do. And he needed…he needed his fellow Sides (his fellow _light_ Sides) to be involved, so that _they_ would see him as the hero. He needed that. He could set it all up in advance and take them through it, smooth as cream. And they would all have a great time and the other three would lavish praise on him for treating them to something so beautiful.

And as long as he was revisiting Thomas’s childhood understanding of the world, why not go all the way and model his adventure on a story Thomas had loved in childhood? Not a Disney one, for a change…something a bit more _intentionally_ meaningful than that.

He knew just the thing.

Roman set aside his current project and marched himself into the Imagination, intent on his mission.

* * *

Hours later, the prince burst into the common area, practically vibrating with anticipation. Four heads swiveled to notice him. He took in the scene in an instant: Logan, standing at an easel with a large whiteboard propped upon it, bearing the heading “WORK/LIFE BALANCE” and a number of bullet points scrawled in three colors of dry-erase marker; Patton and Janus (ugh) sitting on the sofa nearby, engaged in relaxed discussion with the Logical Side and each other; Virgil at the other end of the sofa, headphones clamped over his ears, keeping a wary eye on the proceedings across the room while simultaneously scrolling through something on his phone.

Roman faltered, uncertain of how to begin.

Janus sighed loudly through his teeth—and it was a sigh, not _exactly_ a serpentine hiss—and proclaimed “Mercy me, _look_ at the time.” (There was no clock within his line of sight.) “We’ve been at this for so much longer than I expected while making hardly _any_ progress. I’d best be on my way so we can pick it up again later once our heads have cleared.”

“Aw, Janus, you don’t have to go just because Roman’s here,” said Patton.

“Perhaps not, but I prefer to,” Janus said, shooting Roman a look before spinning on his heel and exiting the room. He assiduously swerved around Roman on the lower steps as he passed, making no physical contact.

“For the record,” Logan said, dismissing the whiteboard and easel, “we have actually made excellent progress in our discussion. I suspect that Janus was engaging in his trademark falsehoods.”

Roman squirmed internally a little. So did that mean…Janus _didn’t_ prefer to leave? Then why—

“So!” Patton said, shifting the room back toward a chipper mood. “What’s going on, kiddo?”

Roman found his voice. “I would like to invite you three…on a quest! Well, more of an adventure than a quest, if you want to get _technical_. Please come! The story is all set up and we just have to run through it!”

Logan frowned slightly as he often did when considering new information. “Approximately how long do you expect it to take?”

“Hardly any time at all,” Roman stated with absolute confidence. “It has this sort of time…warp…thingie, built in. We go into the Imagination, have the adventure, and come back out at the moment just after we left.” No one replied, so he forged ahead. “And it should be totally safe! A little scary or sad in certain parts, maybe but I can personally guarantee a 100% happy ending.”

“A happy ending sounds pretty good,” said Patton.

“My principal objection has been eliminated as well,” Logan agreed.

Virgil heaved to his feet. “Sure, why not. Got nothing else to do tonight.”

Roman felt his heart swell with pride and affection. It was working! This was going to be _amazing_! “This means a lot to me, guys. Really. Come on, then! I can't wait to show you!”

He led them upstairs and to his room, where the doorway to the Imagination had been transformed for the occasion. It was always an ornate double door, made of dark-stained hardwood and covered with carvings of fantastic creatures, but now instead of being flush with the wall, it was part of a tall cabinet, a couple of feet deep and smelling faintly of cedar and camphor.

Roman took hold of the door handles and paused theatrically, looking over his should. “Do not be alarmed by what you see inside.” He threw the doors wide, revealing an assortment of fur coats.

“What is this,” Virgil scoffed playfully, “a wardr...wait a sec.” His eyes widened. “Wardrobe full of fur coats...time warp thingie...dude. Are you taking us to _Narnia_?”

Roman nodded, beaming. “I'm taking you to Narnia.”


	2. Into the Forest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The adventure gets underway.

Patton's eyes were huge. “ _The_ Narnia? With the talking animals and wholesome religious subtext?”

“That's the place,” said Roman. “I mean...I dialed back a little on the religious subtext, since that can be kind of a touchy subject. But Patton, there will be as many talking animals as you want.”

“So how is this going to work?” asked Virgil. “We're the main characters? Will you tell us what to do next?”

“I won't have to!” said Roman. “It's literally just the plot of the first book. All we have to do is go through the major story beats! We'll pick things up at the point where all four Pevensies go through the wardrobe together and meet up with the Beavers, and—”

“Whoa, slow down, Pagemaster. I hate to bust your bubble, but I don't actually remember much about the story.”

“Nor I,” said Logan. “It has been quite some time since Thomas either read the book or watched any of the film adaptations, and in the interim I have grown...” He trailed off, blinking, and then pulled a thin stack of index cards out of his jeans pocket and thumbed through them until he found the one he wanted. “...'fuzzy' on the details.”

“You needed a vocab card for 'fuzzy?'” asked Roman. “Never mind. Don't worry about not being fully up to speed—it's a pretty simple adventure story, and Patton and I can give—”

“Actually...” Patton said, sheepishly raising his hand like a schoolchild, “...I don't really remember much about the story either. I always get distracted by the talking animals and wholesome religious subtext.”

Roman stuck his tongue into his cheek for a moment, considering. Then he brightened. “Even better! This way I'll be able to surprise all three of you! And who knows—maybe it will all come back to you as we go along. So is everyone ready?”

They affirmed that they were.

“Oh. One more thing, before we go in. Stories in the Imagination can take on a life of their own. You might find yourself having...odd impulses, ideas that you're not used to. That's the story, trying to nudge you in a particular direction. It's best to just go along with it. Remember that it's a story for kids, there _will_ be a happy ending, and we're all friends.”

Virgil's eyes widened and he took a breath to speak, but Patton cut in: “I trust you, Roman.” Virgil let out the breath and bit back his protest.

Roman smiled. “Follow me, everyone. And try not to be _too_ alarmed by anything we might encounter...”

They stepped into the wardrobe. Almost at once, a chilly breeze, tasting of snow and pine, fluttered past them and swirled around to tug the doors closed. “Don't worry, that was supposed to happen,” Roman said in a breathless half-whisper. “Head toward the light.” And indeed, as their eyes adjusted to the darkened, fur-lined interior of the wardrobe, they became able to perceive a cool light in the distance, opposite where they had entered. They went for it, pushing and stumbling through the rows of coats, gasping with startled...delight?...when the soft fur gave way to prickly conifer branches, and snow crunched underfoot, and finally blinking in the soft glow of a forest in deep winter.

Roman had gone all out. It was a world of white and blue-gray, the snow caked so thickly that only here and there was a hint of brown bark or green needle visible, and even these colors were muted. The only sounds, apart from the ones the Sides had brought with them, were the soughing of the breeze and the occasional patter of ice crystals from a distant tree branch. And it was _cold—_ so much so that the first thing any of them did, apart from stare agape at the frozen landscape, was Virgil retreating a few yards into the grove they had emerged from and returning with four of the fur coats. He kept one and handed the rest to Patton for distribution.

“See, Virgil?” Roman said, his voice sounding oddly hollow as the snow and wind swallowed it. “You're getting the hang of this story already.”

“Less talk, more...whatever you have planned,” Virgil said, wrapping himself in black rabbit. “Let's get going before we all freeze our...toes off.”

“Hold up...where's Logan?” asked Patton.

“Over here,” came Logan's calm voice from a couple dozen yards away. He was starkly visible as a dark spot against the snow, standing perfectly motionless, huddled into himself and shivering slightly as he stared at the thing that had prompted him to drift away from the group.

“I remember this now,” he said as the others approached. “Come to think of it, it may be part of why I retained so little about the book in the first place. I mean...it's patently ridiculous. What fuels it? There are no gas lines in a wild forest.”

“If you must know...friendly spite,” said Roman.

“That warrants a fuller explanation,” said Logan, accepting a coat from Patton.

“Well,” Roman said, waving the group along, “C.S. Lewis, the author, was great friends with the almighty J.R.R. Tolkien, who told him in rather absolutist terms that you couldn't write about a fantasy world and put a lamppost in it. To which Lewis replied—I'm paraphrasing here—'Oh yeah, homes? _Watch_ me'—and created this delightful world of Narnia, with _that_ lamppost as a signature feature. True story. If nothing else, you have to admire his saucy rebel spirit.”

“I fail to see how that translates into a viable, inexhaustible fuel supply.”

“Aw, Logan!” Patton chirped. “It's a magic lamp in a magic forest! That's all it needs to glow forever!”

“See? Patton gets it!”

“Ease up a little on the noise, guys,” said Virgil. “Anything could be stalking us in this place. Roman, where are we even going?”

“It's not so much _where_ we're going as _what_ we're going to encounter. I condensed this part of the story somewhat and—”

“ _SHH!_ ” Virgil hissed emphatically, pulling up short and throwing his arms out to the sides to stop the others as well. “I heard something in the bushes,” he muttered. “I _told_ you we were being followed. Nobody move until we know what we're dealing with.”

There came a short whistling sound from a patch of shubbery, and a low, dark shape darted out, heading away from them through the brush, muttering in an almost human fashion as it went. Patton's eyes grew enormous. “ _Talking animal!_ ” he cooed, and immediately gave chase. “Wait up, critter! We won't hurt you!”

“Patton, no!” Virgil called. He spun about and thrust a finger in Roman's face, eyes glittering with barely suppressed fury. “If anything happens to him, I will _end_ you.” Then he followed, vaulting over low-growing bushes, somehow not slipping in the snow.

“I didn't _make_ Patton run off,” Roman grumbled as he and Logan brought up the rear.

“Was this part of your plan?” asked Logan.

“The animal, yes, Patton's impulsiveness, no. Virgil's hostility...definitely no. This is supposed to be a fun excursion!”

“I am afraid I have no advice for you.”

They caught up to find Patton inching around and poking at a dense thicket, Virgil staying close but not interfering. “It's in here somewhere,” Patton said as a repeat of the whistle from earlier confirmed his claim, “but I can't find a spot for us to get through.”

“I keep telling him this is a bad idea,” Virgil said.

“Virgil, it's fine,” said Roman. “This is how the story is supposed to go. That's our _guide_ in there.”

“You said these stories could, and I quote, 'take on a life of their own.' How do you know—”

“Aha!” Patton exclaimed with a touch of giggle. “Here we go!” He pulled aside a swath of branches, making an opening easily big enough for them to pass through if they stooped.

It was spacious inside the thicket, with a “roof” of branches low enough that a few twigs brushed the Sides' heads, and a “floor” of earth and dead leaves—the tangle overhead was thick enough to keep out the snow, which meant it also kept out most of the daylight. They could barely make out the form of the creature that had led them there, seeing only that it was stout and dark-furred, with a hunched posture and beady eyes that twinkled in the meager light.

“Aw, it's a _beaver_!” Patton said. “Heeeere, beaver, beaver, beaver!”

“Hush!” the beaver said, bounding across the space. “I brought you here for secrecy's sake, but if you start shouting you'll attract the wrong sort of attention anyway.”

“See, guys?” said Virgil. “We need to be more _careful_.”

“How are you able to speak?” asked Logan, bemused. “You appear to have completely normal morphology for a member of genus _Castor_. Your vocal tract should not be capable of forming such complex sounds, to say nothing of your brain structure.”

“Logan, you're doing it again,” Patton said out of the corner of his mouth.

Mr. Beaver, for his part, ignored the nosy questions in favor of counting the Sides. “Four,” he said with deep satisfaction. “Four Sons of Adam. At last. Narnia has been waiting for you for a long time. I have so much to tell you...but not here. There's only so much privacy we can manage out-of-doors. _Her_ spies are everywhere.”

“Her who?” Virgil said with a hint of a growl.

“Who else?” replied Mr. Beaver. He beckoned them all to lean in close, which in the Sides' case meant leaning _over_ quite a bit. “ _The White Witch._ ”

“Oohhh yeeaahhh, I remember now,” said Patton. “She is one scary lady.”

“Understatement of the year,” Roman muttered.

“The White Witch has kept Narnia in thrall for a hundred years,” the beaver continued, “but now that you four have come, we shall finally see the end of her wicked reign. It has been prophesied.”

“Hang on, hang on,” said Virgil. “Is that the thing where four humans show up, kick the White Witch to the curb, and all settle down as kings of Narnia? Guys…are we actually down for that? I mean, I know Roman is, but…”

“If it’s part of the story, then I say we go for it,” Patton stated firmly.

“We did agree to follow through with the adventure,” said Logan.

“There is much to tell you,” said Mr. Beaver, as if the interruption hadn’t occurred, “but not here. I’ll take you to my place and fill you in on all the details. Now let’s hurry…it’ll be dark soon and you do _not_ want to be caught in these woods after dark.”

They left the shelter of the thicket, and although the sky was overcast, it was indeed evident that the daylight was waning. The trip to the Beavers’ house was undertaken in near-silence, which gave Roman plenty of time to take stock of how the adventure was progressing.

His first thought was that it was going really _well_ , actually. His fellow Sides were settling into their roles as fantasy protagonists, plus or minus a little snark (which was only to be expected). The scenery looked _great_ , Mr. Beaver was following the loose “script” Roman had assigned him without any need for corrective nudging, and the adventure was shaping up just how he had imagined it.

As he thought more about the other Sides' reactions, he realized that they were even taking on rough approximations of the roles of the Pevensie children. Patton accepted everything with wide-eyed wonder, just like Lucy. Logan was being typically skeptical and sensible, much like Susan. And Virgil, in his drive to protect them all from danger, was acting almost like an eldest brother, a la Peter. That just left...

Roman stopped dead in his tracks as a chill that had nothing to do with the snow shot up and down his spine and forked down all his limbs.

_I thought I was your hero..._

_Stories in the Imagination can take on a life of their own..._

He forced his legs to start working again before the rest of the party could notice anything was wrong, and pulled up the hood on his silver mink coat in order to hide the expression of dread that he could feel forming (and to potentially play it off as a sudden bout of chill if anyone did notice).

Anyway, he was destined to be far colder before the night was over.

He should have  _known_ . How could he have overlooked something so simple?

On their final approach to the Beavers' house, Roman turned his eyes northward, toward the twin hills where the story obviously wanted him to go. Could he already spot a hint of an icy spire?

He barely tasted the trout dinner the Beavers served the four of them, barely heard the conversation that ensued. He already knew how it went, after all. His only role in all of it was to duck out early (quack?) and take the relevant news to their enemy.

He had only wanted to be the hero, but  _someone_ had to be the villain, and the story had picked Roman. How could he refuse?


	3. At the Castle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Roman meets the White Witch.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a good time to bring up that I am basing my descriptions of C.S. Lewis's characters on the book much more than any of the adaptations. In case you were wondering why Jadis doesn't seem much like Tilda Swinton.

The snow came down thick and fast, covering Roman's tracks in a matter of minutes. The temperature was dropping fast now that the sun was down, and he had left his fur coat behind at the Beavers' in his haste to get away (to _get this over with_ ), but the cold wasn't bothering him too badly at least—his boots were good, and he had two layers on underneath his regally tailored jacket. (Just because the story was forcing him into Edmund's role didn't mean he had to suffer like Edmund; he liked to think he was made of sterner stuff than a bratty schoolboy who sold his soul for pistachio candy.) Even so it was rough going, especially at first, with the snow flurry blocking nearly all the remaining light. Roman wasn't certain at all that he was maintaining his heading, but there was nothing to do except press on and hope that if nothing else, the _story_ would lead him to his destination, since it was hell-bent on making him go there in the first place.

By and by, the storm began to break up. The snowfall dwindled to a stop and the moon coasted in and out of fragmented clouds, close to full and _startlingly_ bright when it was out, lighting up the snowscape like...like really good stage lighting. Even intermittently, it was enough for Roman to pick out those two northerly hills and keep heading toward them, though he frequently had to detour around gullies and large clumps of trees. Sooner than he expected, the prince found himself staring up at the castle of the White Witch.

It was bigger than he had anticipated. He had designed it, of course, based on the brief description and single illustration in the book, but at Roman's level of experience, “designing” things in the Imagination often involved sending out a few vague parameters and letting the environment hammer down the details. The castle was a mass of thin towers and jagged battlements, more like an accretion than a construction, and under the moonlight it was impossible to tell whether it was made of stone or ice or both or maybe even some weird blend of the two.

Roman swallowed, preparing himself to go in. To go in, and _pretend_ to expect the Witch to make good on her bad-faith promises...

Wait a minute.

_Wait a minute._

_What_ promises?

_Roman had never met the White Witch._

He had started the story several chapters in, _after_ those events would have happened. Which meant that technically...they hadn't happened. He'd never eaten her stupid fake food; he was here because the story needed him to be, not because he was compelled by her sinister enchantment. There was literally no reason for him to go into the castle wheedling and begging. But that left him somewhat at loose ends regarding his approach.

All at once, Roman came to a decision. “If this story wants me to be the villain,” he said aloud, because some things ought to be said aloud, “then I'll show it the kind of villain I can be!”

He stood up straighter, checked to make sure his sword was accessible, and marched toward the frigid castle.

He wondered if the others had noticed his absence yet, but decided it didn't really matter. Not with what he was about to do.

_(Like a creek in a flash flood, the story leapt from its channel, lashing across the landscape of imagination until it found the new course.)_

Getting inside was no problem as the portcullis hung open, the dozens of icicles festooning the iron making it resemble nothing so much as a yawning maw filled with needle-sharp fangs. It was colder within the walls than without, and Roman ducked into his collar as he crossed the courtyard, noting with grim curiosity the “lifelike” stone statues that dotted it every which way—the fate of any Narnian who openly defied the Witch. Directly across from the outer gate was the inner one, and across the threshold lay a massive timber wolf, easily mistaken for a statue itself if one didn’t happen to notice its slow breathing and the wisps of fog at its muzzle. Roman walked up within a few yards of it, and drew his sword.

As he had planned, the metallic rasp roused the wolf, which leapt to its feet with flicker-quick reflexes and made as if to charge Roman, snarling, only to pull up when it saw the steel blade in his hands.

“You make very bold to come here armed, stranger,” said the wolf.

“I am well practiced at boldness,” Roman said. “Am I to understand that I have the dubious pleasure of addressing Maugrim, captain of Her Majesty’s secret police?”

“You understand well enough,” Maugrim replied with a mirthless chuckle. “Unless you wish to curse that name with your dying breath, you will give _your_ name, and your purpose in coming to my queen’s castle at this late hour.”

“You may tell your queen,” Roman said, raising his sword in a defensive stance, “that Prince Roman is here to propose an alliance with her. Any more than that is for her ears, not yours.”

“Do not try my patience, prince or no,” Maugrim said, beginning to pace back and forth as though looking for an opening. “I alone decide who may see the Queen.”

He made a lunge, half in earnest and half testing, and skidded to a halt when Roman whipped his sword around and pointed the tip at the wolf’s throat. “Do not try _me_ …captain,” he said. “Just you go and fetch your mistress, there’s a good boy.”

Maugrim growled deeply, and Roman knew he had made an enemy. But he turned away and said “Follow me,” with a curt snap of his teeth. Roman did, at a safe distance, as the wolf led him through a short ice-walled corridor. They stopped at an archway. “Wait here,” said Maugrim, “and put away your sword. Move from this spot before I get back and I’ll hunt you down and tear your throat out.” As he passed through the archway—Roman could just glimpse a large space beyond it, though the light was too poor for him to make out any details—the prince couldn’t help but be impressed by how _menacing_ Maugrim was. Had _he_ done that, or was it all down to Lewis's writing? The Narnia series could be dark but they were still kids' books, but _this_ baddie wouldn't be out of place in a PG-13 Hollywood blockbuster.

There was muffled conversation from the chamber beyond, and then Maugrim returned. “I can't imagine why, but Her Majesty deigns to receive you. You will not speak until she bids you, and you will address her with the utmost courtesy. You will _bow_ as you enter her presence. Offend my queen, and I will take great pleasure in devouring you down to your bones.”

A dozen retorts jostled for dominance on Roman's tongue, but he bit them all back. He stepped through the archway, bending into a stiff, proper bow with one hand pressed to his chest and the other held at his side. He kept his eyes on the icy floor, and so it was mostly shadow and sound that told him Maugrim was circling him. For the first time since entering the castle, Roman felt truly vulnerable.

“Here he is, my queen. Prince Roman...as he calls himself,” said the wolf. “ _Your Highness_ , you stand in the presence of Her Imperial Majesty, Queen Jadis of Narnia.”

“Your skepticism is misplaced, Maugrim,” said a voice like wind chimes carved from the heart of a glacier. “Whatever else he is, he is certainly a prince. You may rise, Prince Roman.”

Roman unbent, taking in his new surroundings. The room was more of a cavern hollowed out of the ice, lit by some bluish luminescence whose source he could not find, its walls covered with swirling, lumpy forms where water had melted and flowed and re-frozen repeatedly over time. At the far side was a high dais upon which sat a magnificent throne, made, like the room, entirely out of ice, though it seemed more deliberately sculpted. Roman lifted his eyes to the throne's occupant, and for the first time saw the White Witch.

She was _gorgeous_.

Not suddenly-questioning-his-sexuality gorgeous (not least because there was nothing remotely _sexual_ about her; she was chilliness personified), but...she looked like Snow White might look if she grew up and inherited her stepmother's personality. Flawless features, porcelain complexion, lustrous black hair falling in slight waves around her shoulders, crimson lips. Her crown, surprisingly enough, was made of gold and fairly simple in style, just harsh elongated points rising from the rim. Her scepter was gold also and very slender; Roman remembered that it was actually her magic wand. Her royal regalia and her lips made the only spots of warm color in that frigid hall, and Roman realized to his chagrin that her presentation mirrored his own colors: his white suit with its gold braid and bold red sash.

In any case, though she was a tyrant and a usurper, she was every inch a _queen_. Roman bowed again, in a more sweeping fashion.

“Our captain tells us,” said the Witch, “that you have come here seeking an alliance with us. The only question is what you think you could _possibly_ have to offer. If you have been in Narnia for any length of time, you will have seen that our conquest is quite complete. Why should we accede to your proposal?”

Roman chose his words carefully. “Mighty though Your Majesty undoubtedly is, you cannot be everywhere at once. I am in possession of...information, concerning the plans and movements of Your Majesty's enemies.”

The Witch made a scoffing noise, not quite a laugh. “My enemies,” she said pointedly, “are arranged in the courtyard. You passed them on your way in.”

“With all due respect, Majesty, those are only the enemies you know about. Your subjects have learned to be secretive about their rebellion...and there are _quite_ recent developments which could change everything.”

“What developments?” snapped the Witch. Behind Roman, Maugrim picked up his pacing back and forth.

For the first time, Roman actually met her gaze. “I am one of four.” The White Witch's free hand, the one not holding her wand, tightened almost imperceptibly on the arm of her throne. Roman forged ahead. “Significant events have been set in motion, Your Majesty. Without intercession, they may mean your doom. I can help you achieve that intercession. In fact, with the two of us, working together, even Aslan himself cannot—”

“ _How DARE you speak that name in my presence!_ ” the Witch said, suddenly mere inches from Roman. Without at any point seeming to move quickly, she had descended the dais and crossed the space between them in an instant. Through his terror—she loomed over him by nearly a foot, and Maugrim was _right_ behind him, there was no escape—Roman felt a little thrill of triumph, because _he hadn't expected this._ His creations could _surprise_ him, and not just in little ways like the details of their appearance!

“Forgive me, Your Majesty,” he gasped out. “I did not know the mere sound of that name would upset you so. But was it not worth it, for the knowledge that you might yet be rid of him forever? With my help, it can be so. My power combined with yours...”

“Impossible,” Jadis spat. “Do you not know what he _is_ , that one?”

“I know what is said about him,” Roman replied evenly. “But perhaps it is not entirely true?”

A long moment passed. The White Witch took a step back, her lips parting in a slight inhalation. “So,” she said. “That is how it is. And you choose to ally with me? Should I feel flattered?”

“You flatter _me_ ,” Roman said, making another gallant bow.

“Very well then, let us be of an accord. If what you say is true, then we likely have no time to lose.”

“Indeed,” said Roman. “ _He_ may land on Narnia's shore within hours. Tell me, Your Majesty—which feature in this room is your least favorite?”

The Witch glanced around, then gestured languidly at a glob of ice not significantly different from any other. “The asymmetry of that one has always vexed me somewhat.”

Roman strode over to it, drawing his sword, and with a swift motion, sliced off the offending lump. It bounced on the floor with a dull clunk, and he applied his sword to it again, several more times, until he had produced something like a multifaceted gem the size of a large marble. The sheer cold of it bit into his fingertips as he picked it up, and it didn't sparkle properly like a cut gem should. The facets, though mirror-smooth, were as dull as iron.

That would change.

“Have your servants make ready Your Majesty's sleigh,” said Roman, pocketing the ice jewel. “I shall explain everything on the way.”

* * *

_Somewhat earlier..._

“I just don't get it,” Virgil said for the fifth or sixth time, pacing yet another circuit of the Beavers' small one-room lodge.

“So you have said several times before,” said Logan, still sitting awkwardly at the beaver-sized dining table, pinching the bridge of his nose, “and I have explained the situation as I see it each time. I will do so again if you wish, but I question the purpose if my answers are not helping you to understand.”

“Humor me, okay?” said Virgil. “Your droning voice helps me relax for some reason.”

“Very well. While I am not especially familiar with the plot of C.S. Lewis's book, I do seem to recall that one of the four children temporarily departs from the group and falls under the sway of the villainous witch, to be redeemed later. As Roman is the only one of us who does remember the story in detail, it fell to him to play out that role. The rest of us can take our cues from helpful characters such as the Beavers—” Here Logan nodded to their hosts. “—and play out our roles to the necessary degree of accuracy that way. In short, I believe this is all simply part of Roman's plan, and we should not be unduly alarmed.”

“I don't know,” said Patton, wringing a napkin in his hands. “It's so unlike Roman to play anything other than the virtuous hero. And that's what he _said_ he was going to do. I can't help but think something is, well, wrong.”

“Right or wrong,” Mr. Beaver cut in, “we'd best be well away from here before too long.” Mrs. Beaver was already bustling about, packing some supplies for a journey. “We've been compromised. We'll go by back ways and hidden paths, and get to the Stone Table right under the Witch's nose. But we've got to be quick—her enforcers can make the run from her castle in half an hour.”

“ **That fast?** ” Virgil said, the Tempest Tongue instantly taking over his voice. He stopped pacing and started helping Mrs. Beaver shove items into her rucksacks. “ **Let's go let's go let's go!** ”

“Easy, dear, not so rough!” she said helplessly.

“Virgil,” said Logan, “there is little or nothing to be gained by suffering a panic attack. Let me remind you that we already determined, based on the flow of conversation, that Roman was here as of fifty-one minutes ago. Even assuming he left immediately afterward, and positing that informing the Witch of our whereabouts was instantaneous, that would leave a mere twenty-one minutes for him to travel to her castle, in order for her enforcers' arrival to be imminent. Given that they themselves take approximately thirty minutes to make the same journey, and this is implied to be a relatively short amount of time—”

“ _English_ , Teach,” Virgil said, although his voice was back to normal.

“Roman almost certainly has not been gone long enough for any representatives of the White Witch to get here for at least another—excuse me for the imprecision—several minutes. If we make _sensible_ haste, then we can set out with plenty of time to get a lead on them.”

“We'll need our coats,” Patton murmured, getting up to fetch them from the hooks beside the door. “Oh...Roman left his. The poor guy must be freezing his behind off out there!”

“Serve him right if he is,” Virgil opined.

“We should bring it,” Patton continued. “For when we meet up with him again.”

“No, leave it here. It'll be dead weight,” said Mr. Beaver.

And on that ominous note, the little party trooped out into the frozen night.


	4. Off the Beaten Trail

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Roman and the White Witch make their move. Then the Witch makes her move. Then Roman makes his.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heads up, readers, this beloved children's fantasy is about to go right off the rails. C.S. Lewis would NOT approve. But if it really bothers him, he can rise from the grave and haunt me about it. ;)

Aslan, the Great Lion, son of the Emperor-Beyond-the-Sea...the true and ultimate King of Narnia...loped westward across the ocean, the deep rose light of pre-dawn at his back, bounding over the swells as if they were grassy hills. The spray did not even dampen his mighty paws. He was very near his destination, occasionally leaping or dodging floating chunks of ice that had broken off from the freeze that gripped Narnia. They tended to melt as he passed—indeed, a careful observer would have noticed that a span of water around the Lion was tinted a pleasant blue-green, contrasting sharply with the dismal, wintry gray of the rest.

The time was near. Very soon, Narnia would be liberated from its oppressor.

Aslan was within sight of the shore, running over whitecaps. Another half-minute or so and he would be on the beach...but someone was approaching from the north, skimming over the water on an enchanted ice floe. He recognized his old enemy, Jadis the White Witch, the very one he was there to oust from the land...and she was accompanied...

...by a Son of Adam. The young man was richly dressed and held aloft a faceted stone the color of iron or tarnished lead. The Witch wielded her wand. When they were scarcely a stone's throw from Aslan, the human shouted “Now!” and the two of them began to chant:

“Dragon smoke and harpy’s shriek

What was mighty, now is weak

Pluck the mane and quell the roar

Let Narnia have her King no more!”

This they repeated thrice, circling Aslan on their makeshift watercraft. The Lion roared with dismay as a golden nimbus coalesced around him, pulsating and coruscating, and then was drawn off and toward the young man. Honey-colored light flowed into the strange gem, and Aslan appeared to shrink into himself. A wave crashed over him as the two enemies completed their spell.

Jadis and Roman rode the ice floe back to the shore. “How will we know if it worked?” said the White Witch.

“Take a look, Your Majesty,” said Roman, holding up the gem, which had lost its dullness and taken on the clarity and fire of a diamond. Nor was it any longer cold to the touch.

“I cannot touch it, you know,” she said. “Even so contained, that power would burn me alive. He is my opposite in every way. And you guarantee that he is now too weak to do us harm of himself?”

“Judge for yourself,” Roman said, pointing back toward the sea. Some small creature was feebly paddling through the cold gray waves, barely staying afloat amid the breakers. Just as the dawn broke, the tumbling waves deposited it on the sand, where it staggered to its feet, sneezed, shook off a coating of seafoam...and was a cat. A tawny long-haired tomcat, looking perfectly ridiculous as drenched as it was, mewling piteously. It didn't have the strength to run away when the pair approached.

“It would not have worked if he had made landfall first,” Roman said. “The soil of Narnia bolsters him.”

The White Witch raised her wand. “And now the _stone_ of Narnia will be one with him.”

“Wait!” Roman barked. The Witch turned a furious glare upon him. “A slain enemy cannot feel the humiliation of its defeat,” Roman explained. He lunged, caught the cat by the scruff of its neck, and lifted it to his eye level. “We'll cage him back at the castle. And when we tire of him...I think a _public_ petrifaction would send an irrefutable message to your subjects.”

The Witch's eyes widened ever so slightly and she _almost_ smiled. “You have an admirable understanding of these matters, Prince Roman.”

Roman brought the cat right up to his face. “Is this _villainous_ enough for you?” he muttered.

“Roman,” the cat said in the unmistakable deep, regal voice of Aslan, “what have you done?”

Roman recoiled as if bitten, and the cat twisted in his grasp, slashing at his hand with unsheathed claws. Roman lost his hold; the cat dropped awkwardly to the sand and took off like a shot, straight up the beach to the shelter of the scrubby shore plants. They lost sight of him within seconds...but not before Roman noticed that the frost in a _very_ small circle around the animal vanished, only to return after he moved on. He carried a tiny sliver of spring with him.

“Perhaps I spoke too soon,” said the Witch in a clipped tone. She strode up to Roman and slapped his face, and her strength was such that he spun off his feet. “ _FOOL!_ You let him _escape!_ ”

Roman waited a moment for his ears to stop ringing before he even ventured to sit up. “Madam,” he panted, “will you treat me so discourteously?”

“I will treat you however I please. _I_ am Queen. Do not delude yourself that this is a partnership of equals. Now get up. We have to intercept these 'friends' of yours.”

Roman felt a little flutter of fear for his fellow Sides. “Is that really necessary?” he said as he got his feet under him and checked that he still had the gem. He put it in his pocket for safekeeping. “We've won. Aslan can't crown them now. Once he fails to show up at the meeting place, they won't know what to do except go home.”

“Stripped of his power or no, I will take no chances as long as he is free. And our likelihood of capturing _him_ again is miniscule.”

Roman opened his mouth to urge her not to harm them, but thought better of it—with the mood she was in, she would take it as a reason to be crueler. He simply lapsed into silence as the Witch's sleigh caught up with them and they climbed aboard.

“Is it done?” asked her Dwarf driver.

“More or less,” the Witch sighed irritably.

“Home, then, Your Majesty?”

“No—head inland. We must track down the other three Sons of Adam.”

“What does Your Majesty intend with them?” asked the Dwarf, flicking the reins.

“You know...I really have not decided yet. A great deal depends upon Roman's own comportment between now and when we find them.”

Roman closed his eyes as they traveled on, wondering fervently what to do next.

He had to assume the story knew what it was doing. Not because that was the most likely scenario, but because it was his best bet to stay hopeful.

* * *

The weary group crested a hill, looking toward the breaking dawn. From there, nearly the whole eastern basin of Narnia was visible. “There, see?” said Mr. Beaver. “The hill of the Stone Table. That's where we're going. And if you look a little further on, to the coast, you can just make out Cair Paravel, the palace of the _true_ rulers of Narnia. One thing about all this snow—the castle walls stand out a lot better at a distance.”

“But Aslan will bring springtime, right?” Patton said, fluffing the hood of his coat.

“Of course he will, dearie,” said Mrs. Beaver. “We should start seeing the first signs soon enough; he must have arrived in Narnia by now.”

Yet nothing changed for at least two more hours as the party trudged on, through calf-deep snow and freezing gusts. From time to time, wolf howls sounded in the distance: the Witch's enforcers.

They were crossing a broad meadow, out in the open, exposed, when they heard a sudden shriek of triumph, followed by: “There! Three Sons of Adam with the Beavers!  _Faster!_ ” and a sleigh burst from the edge of the forest off to the side. The White Witch had risen from her seat in her murderous excitement, bracing one hand against the back of the driver's seat while the other held her wand aloft. The reindeer accelerated steadily under the Dwarf's goad, fog streaming from their muzzles.

Beside the Witch, slumped over on the seat, was Roman.

“ _Run!_ ” shouted Mr. Beaver.

“But...Roman!” said Patton. “We have to rescue him!”

“Nothing we can do right now, dearie!” said Mr. Beaver. “We've got to take cover!”

They fled, but it was utterly useless; the sleigh gained on them by leaps and bounds, whizzing over the snow that they struggled through. Ironically, what saved them in the moment was itself a minor misfortune—Virgil caught his foot on a large fallen branch hidden in the snow and went sprawling, but in the process it came loose and skittered directly into the reindeer's path, forcing them to veer off. Virgil scrambled back to his feet, adrenaline lending him both strength and grace, and though brief, the digression gave the party just enough time to reach the edge of the trees and lose themselves amid the underbrush.

“We have to go back,” Patton whispered frantically, tucked under the boughs of a bush. “For Roman, we have to—”

“ **Ssh!** ” Virgil interrupted, a hint of his Tempest Tongue coming through. Crunching footsteps were approaching.

“I _will_ find you all, Sons of Adam,” came the silvery voice of the White Witch. “You cannot hide from me here in my own realm.” Mercifully, she moved away after a moment, and the party took her moment of inattention to scamper into a more distant bit of cover.

But there was no way to be  _ quiet _ enough, and they soon heard her approaching again, more resolutely. She was going to find them, she was going to  _ kill _ them (or petrify them, which amounted to the same thing)—

But she didn't. Something else happened instead, something that involved shouting and crackles of magical energy, and then virtual silence.

Five pairs of worried, bewildered eyes met each other in turn. No one dared to speak for a long moment. Then Logan carefully got to his feet and looks around. “It's clear,” he said. “She's gone.”

“G **o** ne wh **e** re?” asked Virgil with just a hint of Tempest.

“I...do not know. But I believe we can safely proceed toward our original destination.”

“Maybe _now_ spring will come...” said Patton, getting up and dusting the snow and forest debris off his clothes. But he didn't sound very hopeful. “I just wish I knew if _Roman_ was okay.”

“May I remind you, this is Roman's story,” said Logan. “He is fine. He is in control.”

Virgil made a derisive snort but said nothing.

“All right then,” said Mr. Beaver. “I've got our bearings again.”

They picked themselves up and continued.

* * *

_Mere moments earlier..._

Roman squeezed his eyes shut all the harder as the sleigh swerved and skidded to a stop, sending up gouts of slush to either side. The seat rocked slightly as Jadis stepped down. “Remain here,” she said. “I will return shortly.” Roman heard her striding away.

Going after the other Sides. His  _ family _ .

But what could he do about it? This was the role the story had chosen for him: the willing but ultimately outclassed ally of the White Witch. His cheek still burned where she had slapped him, more from the humiliation than the blow itself, which had long since faded. If he defied her openly, tried to stop her from attacking his fellow Sides, he would only share their fate.

Death? No. Story scenarios in the Imagination couldn't literally end their existence; that would make no sense at all. They would just be expelled back into the Mindscape proper, as if waking up from a bad dream. But it would mean he had  _ failed _ .

_I thought I was your hero..._

Roman was suddenly  _ furious _ . At the story for taking these turns, or at himself for setting things up so ineptly at the outset? Was there even a difference? It was  _ his _ Imagination. Either way, he had  _ trusted _ the story, and it was betraying him. He could deal with startling twists, downbeat second acts, even tragic endings, as long as the whole was satisfying. But this? Having the main bad guy just roll up and kill the heroes at what would normally be the midpoint? A travesty!

In a burst of inspiration, Roman opened his eyes, stood up, and vaulted lightly from the sleigh.

“Just where do you think _you're_ going?” demanded the Dwarf, who had been adjusted the reindeer's tack. “You heard Her Majesty!”

Roman had been ready for it, and he whipped his sword out of its sheath and leveled it at the Dwarf's face. “Do not try to stop me.”

The Dwarf made a brief, tight nod, swallowed hard, and stood aside by a pace or two. Roman located the Witch's tracks, heading straight toward the nearby trees, and he followed them at a run.

The gem felt very heavy, and almost warm, in his pocket.

He spied the Witch some distance away among the trees, moving with purpose. He came just close enough to let her realize he was approaching, took the gem out, and began chanting.

“Dragon smoke and harpy's shriek

What was mighty, now is weak.”

She stopped short and turned to face him. “What  _ are _ you doing?”

The second couplet leapt into his mind fully formed:

“Scoop the snow and scrape the frost

Her reign must end at any cost!”

The White Witch's eyes widened in alarm as the jewel began to suck her power away, just as it had Aslan's. Blue-white light ripped out of her in coils and flares, and her voice rose to a scream as she realized what was happening. For the gem was able to subtract enough of Aslan's power away to leave only a Talking Cat...but Jadis was nowhere near as puissant. The same amount of energy, taken from her, left...nothing.

A torrent of cold magic lanced toward Roman's gem, but it could not enter. The power of the White Witch—the power that  _ was _ the White Witch—and the power of Aslan could not coexist in the same space. The bluish light shied away from the jewel and plunged, instead, directly into Roman himself.

Ice gripped his heart with a suddenness that made him gasp for breath. His head spun like a tilt-a-whirl. Roman managed to take two, three steps before the forest tipped up on edge and the snow-dusted ground slammed into his shoulder. The ice was spreading, spearing through his shoulders, encasing his lungs and stomach.

Roman made himself get up and staggered out of the trees back toward the sleigh. His head did  _ not _ feel good.

“Where is the Queen?” asked the Dwarf.

Roman had no answer, but as he made eye contact, the Dwarf's mouth dropped open. He skipped back a step and then pressed his hands together in an almost prayerful pose and bowed so low that his head nearly brushed the ground. “Your Majesty,” he murmured. “Your Majesty.”

Roman climbed back into the sleigh. “Take me ho—take me back to the castle,” he panted. The ice continued to crawl outward from his core. He checked to make sure he hadn't dropped the gem along the way—he hadn't, but the flesh of his hand looked strange somehow.

_ Imagine if the others saw you now, _ said a voice not his own, from deep inside his head. He shuddered at the thought, and supposed that was why he had gone straight back to the sleigh instead of trying to find them himself. But the real horror, the one that had yet to sink in fully, the one he wasn't  _ ready _ to let sink in just yet, was this:

He had no idea where the story was supposed to go from here.


	5. Atop the Hill

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Roman confronts the other three Sides.

“Won't be long now,” said Mr. Beaver as the group rounded a low hill. The sun was just starting to sink, and the resulting shadow made them all the colder. They had been on the move for nearly twenty hours, with only brief and infrequent rest stops, and had long since begun dragging their feet. Their trail made a continuous ragged line through the snow.

“I can't feel my _anything_ ,” Patton moaned.

“Well if nothing else,” said Mrs. Beaver, trudging alongside him and patting his hand, “they'll at least have decent campfires where we're going.”

Another twenty-five or so minutes brought them around the base of that hill and the next one, and then the Beavers led the group up the slope of a third and tallest hill. “And here we are,” said Mr. Beaver once they reached the summit. “The hill of the Stone Table.”

The hilltop was a broad space, clear of trees, with a grim gray construction in the very center: the Stone Table itself. It seemed like the whole snowscape of Narnia spread out before them, all the way to the twinkling ocean. It would have been a lovely view if not for the circumstances that had brought them there.

No one greeted them. They thought at first that no one was even there, but Virgil pointed to a hunched figure crouched on the ground some distance away from the table, tending the embers of a small fire by means of an awkwardly long poker held at full arm's length, as if she were afraid to go too near it. She was very slender, with lightly tanned skin and misty pale green hair that stuck out from her head in bristly locks, falling down to merge with her dress, which was the same color and texture.

“Ailim, is that you?” said Mr. Beaver.

“Oh!” said the woman, rising to her feet in one motion, more gracefully than any human could manage. “Beaver...I wasn't expecting you.”

“Ailim...where is everyone?”

She shook her head with a sound like leaves rustling in a breeze. “A few are nearby, keeping to cover. As for the rest...they are safe in their homes. Where else would they be? Aslan has not come after all. Of my people, only my conifer siblings and myself are even awake. The rest of our cousins still sleep.”

“Ailim is a dryad,” Mrs. Beaver explained. “That's the spirit of a tree. In her case, a fir tree.”

“And you must be the humans of the prophecy,” said Ailim. “Do you know why Aslan has not returned?”

“B-beats me, Miss,” Patton said, teeth chattering. “The story seems to have hopped off the rails at some point.”

“Oh, how rude of me not to notice how cold you are. Do come sit by the fire. She crouched to poke up the flames, and used an equally long-handled set of tongs to add another log. Soon it was crackling nicely, and the Sides were clustered around it, sitting on small boulders that had been cleared of snow and soaking up the warmth.

“It doesn't bother you?” Virgil said as Ailim fed the fire again. “Burning wood? I mean, if you're a tree too...”

“This was all fallen and dead already when it was gathered,” she explained. “No Narnian of good heart would _ever_ cut down a living tree, or even take so much as a single branch. Sometimes an aged dryad who knows she will die soon will bequeath her wood to those who need it, but living trees are sacrosanct. Or,” she added sadly, “so it was before the White Witch came.”

“We'll figure something out,” Patton said. “I think…I think the Witch is hurting someone we care about too.”

“In the meantime,” Mr. Beaver cut in, “this lot needs food and rest.”

“Of course,” said the dryad. “There are shelters in the thickets on the southeastern slope, and provisions. Tap three times quickly and twice slowly on the large boulder and the fauns will let you inside.” She met each of their gazes in turn. “In the morning we must hold a council of war.”

* * *

At least Jadis's bed was comfortable enough.

Roman had found it eventually, after wandering the frozen castle for what felt like hours. It was only a broad, thick slab of ice on the floor, but it was heaped with enough blankets and furs that he was adequately shielded from the worst of the cold, both from the frigid air of the castle and the bed itself. He crawled in, his head still spinning, and wrapped himself in layers of bedding like a caterpillar forming its cocoon.

Sleep came quickly, but proper _rest_ did not; Roman's dreams were full of ice and crystal and stone and snowflakes that came spinning down out of a black sky like tiny sawmill blades. Where they touched him he flinched and bled, and his blood was the pale turquoise of a glacial core. It whispered to him in sounds that were _almost_ words and phrases in a language he only partially understood.

Perhaps he thrashed or cried out in his sleep, but if so, no one noticed or responded.

And with the coming of the dawn, Roman opened his eyes...and knew who he was. And what he was.

* * *

The war council never happened.

After their long trek, the Sides had just enough energy left to swallow a few mouthfuls of the stew the fauns had prepared and fall asleep on rough cots in a den of sorts excavated from the hillside. The Narnians hadn't the heart to disturb them, and they didn't wake until the sun was well over the horizon, and then only because a strange, piercing sound was blaring from outside the shelter, coming from some distance away. It was like a horn, but shriller, and it set their teeth on edge.

Bleary-eyed from stolen sleep, they bustled out to find their hosts interrupted in the act of preparing breakfast. “What's going on?” Patton yawned. “Is it time for the council meeting thingie?”

“We're not sure,” said one of the fauns, whose name escaped him. The peculiar sound continued at intervals of a few seconds, and seemed intended as a signal of some kind.

“Something is approaching!” came Ailim’s voice from the hilltop. “Let us all gather as a show of our numbers!”

“ _What_ numbers,” Virgil muttered, but he joined the other two, and the Beavers and fauns and other handful of Narnian citizens now emerging from their respective shelters, in hiking back up to the summit, where Ailim was waiting with another dryad, taller and wirier than herself. They got there just in time to see, bursting through the trees on the northern slope, a Dwarf they barely recognized as the White Witch’s driver. He was blowing on some kind of wind instrument that appeared to be made from silvery crystal—or perhaps ice—which was of course the sound they had all been hearing. Behind him, further downslope, there was some kind of commotion that wasn’t yet visible through the brush and piled snow.

“Narnians!” bellowed the Dwarf. “Make ready to receive your most exalted ruler, the White Warlock!”

“ _What?_ ” Virgil growled.

“White Warlock?” said Patton. “No, it’s supposed to be the White _Witch_. A scary lady! I remember that part!”

“'Warlock' is a semi-archaic term for a male witch,” Logan observed.

“Guys, I have the _worst_ feeling about this…” said Virgil.

More creatures were emerging from the trees on the hill slope, and it took the Sides a moment to realize that they were looking at a procession of monsters. First was a group of Goblin heralds carrying gonfalons that seemed to consist only of crosspieces crusted with masses of icicles. Then came a formation of Dwarf archers, and then several Ogres bearing clubs. Following this were a few Hags, hissing and pointing threateningly into the gathering.

(“What is this, the whole bloody entourage?” whispered Mr. Beaver. “ _Dear!_ Mind your language!” Mrs. Beaver retorted.)

As the procession reached the hilltop, it broke to its right, circling the space counterclockwise and fanning out along the other side of the Stone Table from the Sides and their allies, effectively corralling them—they  _could_ retreat, technically, but there was only one direction available; they would be easy pickings if they tried.

Finally, the White Warlock himself appeared, lounging in a fur-lined sedan chair on the shoulders of four massive Minotaurs. His crown glittered as he moved in and out of patches of shade and his robe was made entirely of ermine, with a train that trailed behind the chair for ten yards, held off the ground by a team of Yew-dryads, their short shaggy hair speckled with scarlet berries. The Minotaurs crested the hill, and one of them kicked snow over the smoldering campfire, extinguishing it. They eased the chair down, and the Warlock rose from his seat, stepped lightly to the ground, and turned to face them.

It was Roman...and he was  _wrong_ .

They knew what “evil Roman” was supposed to look like. The fans loved to imagine him, for some reason, and they tagged Thomas in their fanart of the concept often enough that the Sides were familiar with the consensus image: the haughty expression, the gaudy gold crown studded with rubies, and  _especially_ the transformation of his suit from pristine, heroic white to Disney Villain black.

It wasn't...it wasn't supposed to become  _even whiter_ . It wasn't supposed to gleam almost too bright to look at in the sunlight, so that even the ermine barely looked white by comparison. The gold braid wasn't supposed to be replaced with silver, nor the noble red of his sash with a dusky grayish mauve like dried rose petals under a veneer of frost. The crown was not supposed to be made of silvery ice, with only a single huge diamond set under the central point.

His hair was not supposed to be shot through with white strands that turned out, upon closer inspection, to be ornamentation of impossibly delicate ice filigree. His eyes were definitely not supposed to be  _gray_ , flecked with blue-green. And he was  _not_ supposed to be pale, but he was—paler than Virgil, if such a thing were possible, lacking even a cold-induced blush to his cheeks, yet without looking the least bit unhealthy. It was as if he had been molded out of ivory.

The only hint of warmth in his appearance was that diamond, which flashed all the colors of fire.

He was  _wrong_ .

“Hark! You are all guilty of high treason against the Crown!” he said without preamble, and his voice at least, if not the disdainful tone, was familiar. “Except you three,” he added with a curt nod at his fellow Sides. “However! We are in a lenient mood! Abandon your rebellion at once, and swear fealty to us, and you will not be punished...this time. As for you...” He addressed the Sides again, and for just a moment, his cold arrogance retreated, “...in exchange for _your_ fealty, I will make you all lesser Kings in my court. Think of it! This glorious winter kingdom could belong to all of us!”

The Narnians shuffled on their feet, making no reply. The Sides traded glances, Logan frowning uncertainly and Virgil shaking his head with a haunted expression. Finally, Patton spoke.

“Roman...this isn't fun anymore, with you acting like this. This isn't how you said the story was going to go. Can we just...go home? We can talk out whatever's bothering you.”

It was shocking how quickly Roman's eyes hardened. “I will not be mocked,” he said, low and dangerous. “You have one day and night to change your minds...or else prepare for war. And these—” he made an expansive gesture at the creatures he had brought with him, “—are merely the outermost tip of my armies.” He returned to his sedan chair and the Minotaurs hoisted it up. The procession began to descend the hill.

“Down with the White Warlock!” blurted the taller Dryad, Ailim's companion. “Aslan is King!”

Roman's head whipped around to glare at her. Without a single word, he nodded to the nearest of the Hags, and she lunged at the Dryad, shrieking and making a throwing gesture. There was something like a flash of light in reverse—a flash of darkness—and the tall tree-spirit sank to the ground with a sigh.

“Muricata!” Ailim cried as one of the Ogres stepped forward and lifted the fallen nymph in one massive hand.

“Find her tree,” growled the White Warlock. “Cut it down while she watches.”

“No! _Please!_ ” Ailim begged. “She is my sister!”

“Take the other one as well. Let them _both_ watch.” A second Ogre seized Ailim and began dragging her along while she screamed in terror and grief.

“Roman!” Patton gasped. “H-how _could_ you?”

“Don't make me punish you as well!” Roman snarled. “Move out!”

The procession withdrew back down the hill, leaving the Narnians devastated and the Sides both bewildered and appalled. “So  _now_ what?” Virgil said, pacing erratically and pulling at his hair. “This is  _really_ bad, you guys. Super bad. We're not just talking rail-jumping here. Roman's taken a flying leap off...off  _something_ , I don't know, but there is something  _wrong_ with him. I thought maybe he was just throwing a surprise twist at us, but did you  _see_ him? That look in his eyes? This is  _so bad_ —”

“Virgil, you are spiraling,” said Logan. “Try one of your breathing exercises.”

“I don't understand,” said Patton. “Why would Roman go this far? Do you think he's mad at us for something?”

“It is possible,” said Logan. “He has undergone a number of upsetting occurrences recently, and his mood has not been the most stable. Then again, with his talk of 'swearing fealty'...perhaps he is simply craving validation.”

“Should we just give it to him then?” said Virgil. I mean if it's the fastest way to get him off the crazy train...”

“Unfortunately, I have to advise against indulging him in this,” said Logan. “While it may work in the short term to, as you say, 'get him off the crazy train'—which does not sound like a practical _or_ enjoyable means of transportation, by the way—the likely long-term effect would be to encourage him to continue these destructive methods of addressing his self-esteem deficits.”

“Patton, you're the 'should' guy around here...what should we do?”

“I'm honestly thinking we should just leave. The best way to send a message that the game is no good, is to quit playing. He can grapple with his feelings as long as he needs to, and we'll be there for him when he's ready to come out and talk.”

“I would tend to agree,” said Logan, “but I doubt there is any way for us to leave the Imagination without Roman noticing, and in his current state he would be certain to take steps to stop us, possibly violently.” He began to pace rapidly, wearing a tamped-down groove in the snow. “However...perhaps _one_ of us could make it back to the door undetected, leave, and come back with...additional resources.”

“What kind of 'additional resources' did you have in mind?” said Virgil.

“It occurs to me,” Logan said, still pacing, “that Roman is rather...comfortable, with the three of us. That may cause him to take our points of view for granted, which ironically makes him less likely to listen to us than to someone with whom he might experience more interpersonal friction.”

There was a beat while Virgil and Patton took that in. “Oh,  _no_ !” Virgil said after a moment. “If you're suggesting what I think you're suggesting, then...no. I can't agree with that.”

“Just so we're on the same page,” Patton said carefully, “you want to go get Janus? You think he could help?”

“I think his presence might shock Roman just enough to shake him out of his assumptions about how this story is meant to go,” Logan explained.

“You could be right,” said Patton. “Roman arranged all this because he hasn't felt much like a hero ever since we started including Janus in our discussions. But somehow he wound up going completely the other way, to being the villain. Maybe seeing Janus will remind him of what he's trying to avoid?”

“Okay, cool, so I'm outvoted. Coolcoolcoolcoolcoolcool. So which one of us should go?”

“I was planning on doing it myself,” said Logan. “It would not be fair to ask you to carry out a plan to which you object, and between myself and Patton, I believe I have a greater chance of making the trek without getting sidetracked or losing my nerve. No offense, Patton.”

“None taken. It's an awfully long way to go by yourself, though. Are you sure you even know the way?”

“I have an excellent head for navigation and I believe I can triangulate the location of the door based on our travels thus far. I would feel more confident if I had some form of transportation, however.”

“I can carry you, sir,” said a deep but young-sounding voice from among the Narnians. It was the largest of those gathered, a Talking Bear not quite full grown but undeniably burly and powerful. “Name of Stoutpaws, sir. I'm not as good as a Horse but I'll do my best.”

“It is a pleasure to meet you, Stoutpaws. My name is Logan. If we start now, I estimate you can get me to my destination before sundown.”

“You're leaving already?” Patton said, fretting.

“Roman has only given us until tomorrow, Patton. Given the round trip, I need to use every minute I can to make sure I bring Janus back here before the deadline.”

Patton strode up and pulled him into a hug. “You be careful.”

“Likewise,” said Logan.

“I'll guard him with my life, sir,” said Stoutpaws. He crouched on all fours so that Logan could climb onto his back and then loped away down the westward slope of the hill.

“Gosh, things are happening fast,” Patton said, watching them go. “It all started so simply.”

“Come on, Pat,” said Virgil with a lopsided smile that got nowhere near his eyes, “you should know by now that nothing in this mind of Thomas's is ever simple. And on that note...we should probably pull this bunch together and come up with some contingency plans, just in case Logan doesn't get back in time.”

“Yeah,” Patton agreed noncommittally. “And someone oughta buck them up. They just watched two of their own get dragged away by the bad guys to be...” He trailed off.

“Don't think about it too much,” Virgil said. “Just...yeah, don't think about it.” The gathering was breaking up, the Narnians returning dejected to their hillside shelters. Patton and Virgil joined them.

Unseen in the snow-dusted brush nearby, someone was watching...


	6. Along Separate Roads

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two new challengers arrive...

People often underestimate how fast bears can run. They're so bulky, and most of the time are content to lumber along in an unhurried fashion. The best way to _stop_ underestimating them is surely to be chased by one—anyone who experiences that will remember bears as the speedy animals that they actually are for however long the rest of their life might be.

The second-best way, though, might just be to ride one at a full gallop over miles of Narnian countryside.

Logan wondered just how fast they were going—he estimated between 35 and 40 kilometers per hour. With visual cues, he could have pinpointed their average speed more precisely, but he was clinging to Stoutpaws's back with his head down to minimize air resistance and his eyes closed to keep the freezing wind out of them. The bear's fur was unpleasantly coarse and smelled of a cloying mixture of dirt, honey, and wild animal, but Logan pushed all that to the back of his mind. This was necessary.

It was hours before they paused, and then only so Stoutpaws could shuffle to the top of a small bluff and confirm their destination. “That wood there,” he said, pointing with one paw. “Lantern Waste. That's where you came from, right, sir?”

“If the word 'Lantern' in the name refers to an antique lamppost stationed in the woods and inexplicably in operation, then yes. I believe the door we came through is just beyond it.”

“You use a lot of big words, don't you, sir?”

“I value precision in communication.”

They continued. Another hour brought them to the edge of Lantern Waste, and Stoutpaws slowed and let Logan dismount so that they could navigate more carefully. “Thus far, I do not recognize any specific landmarks,” the Logical Side noted after a time. “But it occurs to me that the lamppost is a unique feature in this forest, composed primarily of cast iron in contrast to the natural wood and stone that surrounds us. And I am given to understand that bears have an exceptionally keen olfactory sense. Perhaps you could locate it by scent?”

“I can certainly try, sir.” Stoutpaws reared up on his hind paws and turned his head from side to side with great nostril-flaring sniffs.

“As long as we are conversing, I would like to mention that there is no need to address me with an honorific. If you wish, you may call me by my name: Logan.”

“Oh no, sir, I couldn't do that. You're to be King, after all. And a fine one you'll make with your careful way of speaking, if I do say so myself.”

Logan found that he had no response to that. He recalled that the original book ended with the four children being crowned as monarchs of Narnia, but he couldn't say the prospect appealed to him. Neither did it pall, however. Still, he was pretty sure Stoutpaws had just complimented him, so he offered a nod of appreciation when he next met the beast's eye.

“No iron yet,” Stoutpaws was saying, “but I think the wind is against me. And there's something else...” He awkwardly pivoted on his paws, smelling to the northeast. “Hang on, that's the scent of reindeer! And lacquered wood! It's a sleigh! It's _him—_ the White Warlock! He's after us!” He dropped back down to all fours and began pacing in a tight circle. “What shall we do, sir?”

“Let me up,” said Logan. “Head deeper into the wood and keep trying to smell out the lamppost.”

“I can't outpace the Warlock's sleigh!”

“Do your best, then, to buy us some time, and I'll work out a plan in the meantime.”

“Yes, _sir_!”

Stoutpaws took off at a dead gallop through the wood. They hadn't gone far when his nostrils flared wide and he declared, “I smell iron! ( _puff, puff_ ) At least we're heading ( _puff_ ) the right way!”

But just as they came within sight of the incongruous fixture, they began to hear, from somewhere behind them, the jingle of sleigh harness. “Oh, sir, he's _coming_! He'll catch us for sure!”

Logan found himself wincing at the young bear's plaintive tone. “Let me down here.” Stoutpaws skidded to a halt and Logan dismounted once again. The sound of the sleigh was not as close as they had feared; Roman must have had to slow down among the trees. “I'll make it the rest of the way to the wardrobe on my own. You find a place to hide, and if anything should go wrong...please return to the others and let them know.”

“Nothing doing, sir! I-I promised to protect you with my life!”

“The best way for you to protect any of us right now is with _information_. Remember that, Stoutpaws. Knowledge is far more precious than strength or speed or even magic. Get yourself behind cover. Protect what you _know_.”

Stoutpaws's eyes were wide under his ears, half-flattened with fear. “Yes, sir,” he said meekly, before loping away toward denser brush. Logan stooped to pick up a pebble as the sound of the sleigh drew nearer and turned to sprint toward the lamppost just as it broke through the closest layer of trees and he heard Roman's bark of triumph.

Logan's turn of speed surprised even him, but he supposed it was only to be expected with the combination of adrenaline and fresh, unpolluted air. He had nothing on a reindeer-drawn sleigh, however, and with the grove of the wardrobe mere yards away, he felt a whiff of animal breath on the back of his head. In the next instant, he hurled the pebble as hard as he could into the grove and flung himself to one side in order to avoid being run down, losing his coat in the process. He landed hard, half-winded, the chill of the snow biting into his suddenly unprotected forearms, and wasn't able to pick himself up as quickly as he liked. He had only managed to raise himself up to his knees before Roman stood over him, looking every bit as menacing as he had that morning.

“I would have thought Virgil would be the one to try and escape. Did you really think I'd let any of you just _leave_?”

“Roman,” Logan panted, “this is highly uncharacteristic behavior for you. I would adv—”

“Spare me, Pointdexter, you're not my guidance counselor!” He reached out, and Logan found his chin forcibly tipped up by the end of what seemed to be an ornately carved icicle. “What was that you threw just then, Logan?”

Logan met his gaze with rock-steadiness. “A message.”

Roman's eyes widened and he turned to shout at his Dwarf attendant. “Hurry up! Get in there and intercept it!”

“Yes, Your Majesty!”

Roman watched him scamper off before turning back to Logan. “It must suck to get so close to your goal and then fail at the last minute.”

Now that it was just the two of them, Logan noted, Roman had reverted to a more colloquial mode of speech. He carefully said nothing, balanced precariously between the desire to keep Roman talking and perhaps obtain clues to his precise mental state and how it had come about...and the need to avoid angering him further.

“Well? Don't you have anything to say?”

So much for remaining quiet... “I regret this course of events.”

“Funnily enough, _I don't_. Strike a pose, nerd.” Roman raised the icicle over his head, and Logan realized, just too late to defend himself, that it was actually a magic wand. He reflexively cringed away, taking whatever small comfort he could from the fact that he had _succeeded_ at every part of his plan that was under his direct control...

* * *

Patton decided to go for a walk. He'd had no luck at all cheering the Narnians up—if anything, their sadness was piling up on him, worsening his own—and he had reached the point where it was either get some fresh air and solitude, or have a breakdown in front of everyone.

Virgil insisted upon making sure it was safe first. They sent out a Talking Dog called Scuffer and a Raven by the name of Sallowpad out to scout the area by land and air, respectively, and make sure none of the enemy were nearby. Then one of the Fauns loaned Patton his pipes, so that he could blow an alert in case of any surprises. Thus equipped, Patton bundled into his fur coat and scrambled out of the shelter just ahead of the tears that were threatening to fall. The cold, clean air helped him gulp them back for the time being, and once he got farther from the camp, farther from all those forlorn faces and despondent voices, the space under the trees, with only his own quietly crunching footsteps and misty breaths for companions, helped to dissipate the horrid feelings.

 _Everything_ was going wrong. He couldn't deny that. The story wasn't going the way it should, not at all, and he and Virgil and Logan weren't familiar enough with it to figure out what the problem was and nudge it back on track, and he'd _tried_ talking to the Narnians about the White Witch but their responses were always about the White Warlock as if whatever was going on with Roman had _overwritten_ her, and...and...and...

And if Patton understood the situation with the Dryads correctly, Roman had just ordered someone _killed_ in cold blood. She was just a figment of the Imagination, but it was still a cruel, vicious, tyrannical act! He just couldn't wrap his mind around the idea of Roman, the noble fairy tale prince, doing something like that. But he knew he had to fix it, but how _could_ he, when he couldn't figure out how it had come about?

How could he, when he couldn't even inject a little cheer into a ragtag group of talking animals and fantasy creatures?

He came to a small clearing—well, more of a space between large trunks. The branches of the trees arched overhead, nearly meeting in the middle, so that in the summer, with everything in full leaf, the ground beneath would be too shaded to let anything other than ferns and moss grow. Right now, of course, there was nothing but a thick layer of snow covering a slightly thinner layer of dead leaves...except in one spot, where there was a patch of sun that seemed to have built up just enough warmth to let the snow melt and reveal the musty earth.

And sitting in that patch of sun was a cat.

Despite everything, Patton almost laughed out loud—probably the only outdoor spot in all of Narnia that was even a little warm, and a cat had found it. The stifled laugh came out as more of a snort, and the cat—which had been lying down in a semi-circle with its back to him—twisted its head to see where the noise had come from. “Hiya, kitty,” Patton said shyly. “I didn't mean to bother you.”

The cat stood up, yawned, stretched, and sat. Now facing Patton, it looked up at him with intensely golden eyes. It was a handsome creature, with long, tawny-colored hair that didn't seem to have picked up any mats or burrs.

“I sure wish I could pet you,” Patton went on. “I think I could use some furry snuggles right now, but I'm afraid you'd set off my allergies.”

The cat hopped to its feet and walked up to the Moral Side, turning its body sideways as it approached. It stopped about a foot shy of making contact with his legs and gazed up at him, as if asking permission. “Well...” Patton said, “...I guess a minute or two can't hurt. If anyone asks I can blame my symptoms on the cold air.” He stooped and held out his hand, and the cat rammed itself against his legs before half-rearing up to rub its head against his outstretched knuckles. “Heh, listen to me, planning to tell a fib. I must be hanging out with Janus too much. Wow, you sure are friendly, aren't you? Do you talk at all? No? I guess even here, not everything can talk.”

He slouched until he was sitting with his back against one of the trees and shifted from letting the cat rub his hand to actively running his fingers through the fur of its head. “I just don't want Virgil to think I'm not being careful. I don't think I could stand disappointing anyone else today, you know?” He sniffed a few times and couldn't tell whether it was hay fever or his emotions starting to spill over again. “I don't understand what's _happening_ , kitty. One of my best friends is acting like the bad guy! And he's always been so idealistic! He hates evil! What could possibly make someone do a one-eighty like that?”

He leaned his head back against the tree trunk and closed his eyes. The sun must have been hitting the wood too, because it felt incongruously warm against his scalp. He continued to card his fingers through the cat's thick fur as fat tears finally began to leak from between his eyelids. Not hay fever, then. He didn't bother holding them back anymore. No one was around to be annoyed or to make a fuss over poor, sensitive, fragile Patton. It was just him and this startlingly affectionate feral cat. For a few minutes, he let the tears flow. They _didn't_ freeze on his face—it wasn't quite _that_ cold—so that was all right. They did make his cheeks burn a little from the salt and the chill of evaporation, but that was all part of the cleansing process. There was no better short-term therapy for icky feelings than a good cry.

The faucet gradually shut itself off. He suddenly envisioned Roman, the White Warlock, with his too-pale coloration and his huge ermine train and his icy crown with that monster diamond on it and his retinue of horror creatures. The image was unusually clear in his mind (Patton's imagination had always worked more based on how things made him feel, not how they looked), almost as if it were a painting that he could scrutinize at his leisure. For some reason, his attention kept getting drawn back to that diamond. Patton grew very pensive. If the diamond was drawing his notice, then maybe his gut had picked up on something important about it, and Patton was not in the habit of ignoring his gut. Not when it craved chocolate chip cookies, and not in situations like this.

He had to file the thought away for later, because the cat was suddenly pawing at his leg. “What is it, buddy? Are we done with pets?”

The cat ran a short distance away, stopped, and looked back over its shoulder at him, blinking meaningfully.

“You want me to follow you? Okay, gimme a sec to get up.” He braced against the tree and heaved himself to his feet, then let the cat lead him out of the clearing.

(He completely failed to notice that the snow dwindled away under its paws, only to return as it passed.)

He followed his guide for perhaps fifteen or twenty minutes, to a small grove of evergreens, like a forgotten Christmas tree farm. He hadn't know what to expect, but he was surprised anyway by the sight of none other than Ailim, kneeling near the center of the grove, her posture slumped. Directly in front of her was the stump of a pine tree that had been sawn off about two feet above the ground. The cut looked quite fresh, and—oh. _Oh. Oh...heck._

“Ailim?” he said.

“Oh!” she responded, startled. “It's Patton, isn't it? What are you doing here?”

“My new fuzzy friend brought me.”

She just looked perplexed. “What friend?”

Patton looked around, but the cat was suddenly nowhere to be seen. “Well, he _was_ here...I guess he led me here for a reason.”

“I apologize for appearing in this unseemly state.”

“No, please don't! You have every right to be out of sorts! Do you...maybe...want to talk about it?”

She looked downcast again. “There is little enough to talk about. The Hags divined the whereabouts of Muricata's tree and the party dragged us both here. She could barely keep her feet, so they made me hold her up. They used a saw. I _felt_ her agony as her trunk was gouged apart.”

Patton flinched. His gorge rose slightly.

“When the tree fell, I felt the life leave her. Then she vanished from my arms. My sister...she is gone from the world. It is as if she had never sprouted.”

Patton rushed forward, shrugged out of his coat, and draped it over the miserable Dryad. She wasn't crying, but she evidently had been earlier; twin trails of hardened yellow resin ran from her eyes down to her chin. “I'm so sorry,” he murmured. Beyond that, he was at a loss. He wanted to promise her to make it better, but...her sister was _gone_. Murdered. Cut down in her prime (literally).

They hadn't even been neat about it. The stump was scarred with a shallow cut well below where it had eventually been felled. Patton ran his fingers over it, his heart squeezing in vicarious anguish. It seemed they had _tortured_ Muricata first...but Ailim hadn't mentioned torture in her brief description of the execution.

As if she could tell what he was thinking, she said, “They started there, but the Warlock told them to do it higher up instead. I don't know why.”

Patton's heart was suddenly hammering against his ribs. This felt _important_. What was he looking for? What was the difference between the lower cut and the upper one, that Roman would make that call? Did he just want a convenient place to sit down in the forest? No, that was silly. Patton wished he were smart like Logan so he could figure out this sort of thing. He closed his eyes for a moment, and when he opened them again they refocused of their own accord at the farther edge of the cut stump, where there was a sprig of greenery...

Patton walked around and peered closely at a few sprouts of fresh green needles growing directly out of the side of the trunk, as happens on pine trees. “Um...Ailim?,” he said, his voice wobbling with uncertainty, “I don't know if this helps at all, but this tree isn't totally dead. They left a growing part.”

“ _What?_ ” Ailim said breathlessly, letting the coat fall from her shoulders as she sprang up. She leaned over the stump without touching it, peering at the needles. “You speak the truth. There is life left in the tree; it may yet regrow.” She gathered an armload of snow from the forest floor and spread it over the top of the stump. “In the meantime, this will protect it.”

“Does that mean your sister would come back?”

“I cannot say. The tree might acquire a new spirit, or Muricata might emerge again but without her previous memories. Or it might remain an unawakened tree, alive but with no sentient soul. But it seems that for all his wickedness, the White Warlock chose to leave this door open.”

“Yeah...” Patton said. “He made sure they cut above the growth. And he let _you_ go. Ailim, will you come back to the camp with me? Everyone will be glad to see you're okay, and I think we should all sit down and try to figure out what it means that Roman did this. My head's starting to hurt from trying to solve these puzzles on my own.”

“Nevertheless,” said Ailim, fetching Patton's coat and offering it back to him, “you spotted this sign. You have given me a measure of hope, however slim. Thank you, Patton.”

And as they started back toward the Hill of the Stone Table, Patton began to feel like a few things were going right after all.

Halfway there, it suddenly occurred to him that the cat hadn't set off his allergies in the slightest.

Huh. That was weird.

* * *

Anything can happen in the Mindscape. Expect, as they say, the unexpected.

But Janus was of the opinion that there was no excuse for him to be walking along the upstairs hallway simply minding Thomas's business and suddenly get _jumped_ out of _nowhere_. One instant everything was normal, the next he was flat on his back, struggling to hold a knife away from his face while the wielder of the knife, who had bulbous features and a shocking quantity of beard, was snarling at him. He caught something about a message and a warlock, but his attacker seemed to have worked himself up into a lather long before encountering Janus and was, in the main, unintelligible.

This left Janus with no clue what the fellow wanted, and when you don't know what someone wants you can't give it to them (or convince them that you've given it to them and pocket the difference) and get them to stop trying to stick a knife in your eye. Add to that the fact that he'd been _completely_ unprepared for this, and that his attacker was noticeably stronger than himself, and Janus was well and truly up [ _Censored for indelicate language_ ] Creek, sans paddle.

If there was one thing he hated, it was _not_ being in quiet control of a situation. If there was one thing he utterly _despised_ , it was having to adapt on the fly.

Well, if anyone in the Mindscape knew how to cope with [ _Censored_ ] Creek...besides, this was probably his fault anyway.

“ _REMUSSSSSS!!!_ ” Janus hissed, even though he was trying not to. High stress had that effect on him.

He heard, in the following order: rapidly approaching footsteps, “What's u—WOW!”, a sickening _crunch_ as Remus's morningstar made contact, and the heavy _thump_ of a body hitting the wall. Then Janus was free. He sat up to take stock.

His attacker was definitely dead, given the shape of his head, and he was a lot shorter than Janus would have assumed given his strength—a fantasy dwarf, then. That was all he was able to discern before the being evaporated into sparkling motes of light that dissipated: proof positive that he had been a figment. “Mind explaining what that was all about, Your Disgrace?” he said.

Remus was pouting at his weapon, probably because the victim's blood had also vanished. “Your guess is as good as mine, my favorite phallic symbol. Must have been one of my brother's.”

That gave Janus pause. He'd assumed, once Roman barged in on the morning's assemblage and then the entire cadre vanished for the day, that he had taken them on a jaunt in the Imagination...but to let a mayhem-oriented figment _out_ unsupervised? That suggested...difficulties. And when he considered the dwarf's vague reference to a message...hm.

“Purely in the interest of maintaining order in this psyche,” he said in the most chipper tone he could manage, “I am going to get to the bottom of this.” He stood up, dusted himself off, and headed for Roman's room.

Remus, unsurprisingly, was right behind him. “Sounds like a blast! There's always plenty to maim when Roman gets into adventure mode! I'm coming too!”

“I'd be simply delighted to have your company,” said Janus. Remus, bless him, either missed the sarcasm or didn't care.

Roman's room was a mess, which was nothing out of the ordinary. This mess appeared to be the result of a deliberate ransacking, which was. Presumably the dwarf was the culprit; perhaps he'd been looking for the “message.”

The doorway to the Imagination, which had taken the form of a large wooden double-doored cupboard, stood wide open. One door actually hung askew from a single hinge, befitting the overall atmosphere of the room. Janus summoned his crook as a precaution before stepping inside.

About a minute later, he was already having regrets. Roman had made some sort of winter wonderland, and Janus's semi-reptilian biology was already starting to protest being made to function in the low temperatures. He turned up his collar, pulled down his hat, and tucked his free hand into his capelet, but he was going to have to find more layers somewhere. Maybe he could get Remus to create him a nice wool coat. Or some longjohns. (Although he was hesitant to ask, as he wouldn't put it past the Duke to instead grant him a yak pelt so fresh that it was still bleeding.)

“Hey, look, someone made an ice sculpture of the buzzkill!”

Janus looked up from his ruminations. Remus had indeed discovered a life-sized, transparent statue of Logan, but upon closer inspection, it proved to be not ice but rock crystal (silicon dioxide, as Logan himself would specify). The Logical Side was depicted kneeling, leaning back on one hand and flinging the other one up and out as if in self-defense. His expression was decidedly alarmed, and taken as a whole, the presentation made Janus distinctly uneasy. And the more he inspected the sculpture, the more that feeling grew. The thing was _unreasonably_ detailed. He could make out the knit texture of his polo shirt and individual strands of hair...and because it was transparent, he could see that the carving went layers deep—Logan's necktie ran completely around underneath his shirt collar, and his eyes were engraved behind the lenses of his glasses.

“Welp!” Remus was saying, raising his morningstar. “Smashy smashy!”

The horrible truth dawned on Janus just in time. He lashed out with his crook to snag Remus's ankle and pull him off-balance before he could bring the weapon down.

“Awwwww! What did you do that for, J-Anus?”

Janus found himself trembling, and no longer could he blame it entirely on the cold. “Speaking purely as a hypothetical,” he said with an embarrassing creak in his voice, “what if that weren't, by the strictest definition, a sculpture?”

Remus tilted his head in confusion. “Well, what else would it...” His kohl-rimmed eyes widened in some chaotic hybrid of shock and glee. “Nooo! You mean someone's gone and put the ol' Medusa whammy on Geekboy?”

“Obviously.” Janus looked around the snowy forest, wary of everything. “I think,” he said, choosing his words with the utmost of care, because they were the truth, “that there is a great deal of trouble afoot here.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sallowpad the Raven appears as a minor character in The Horse and His Boy, which takes place during the time skip at the end of LWW. I thought it would be a nice cameo.


End file.
